Definitions: Grizzly Bear

(1) A notoriously messy eater among bears, scientific name Ursus arctos horribilis. Is commonly known as griz or silvertip after its often "grizzled" or grayed-out pelt. Size: large, six to nine feet long, three to four feet high at the shoulder, weighing from 300 up to 1400 pounds. (Or 2 to 3 meters long, 1 to 1.2 meters high, 135 to 635kg). Color can vary from blond in the Los Angeles / Hollywood / Florida areas to almost black in less hip regions like New York City, Chicago, Minneapolis. Diet is mostly vegetation (i.e., grasses, nuts, berries, and roots), plus small mammals, salmon, bison, elk, caribou, carrion, and backpackers (when they are in season).

Current grizzly populations have been documented only in Montana, Wyoming, Idaho, and Washington, but they are listed as threatened under the federal Endangered Species Act in all 48 of the contiguous states. Scat usually occurs in large mounds, often filled with berry seeds or fish scales, sometimes revealing cans of pepper spray or hiker's warning bells.

(2) Giant hamster. Also known as the giant mountain hamster, it is an exceedingly large, extraordinarily rare, but entirely harmless beast often mistaken for an impossibly gigantic grizzly bear, when seen at all, which is vanishingly seldom, or you'd have heard of it.

But since they, like all hamsters, are nocturnal, they are, when sighted at all, seen at night, and may appear only as a vast, shuffling and silent shadow off in the darkness, which can make them seem all the more frightening.

If encountered, which is almost never (seriously — really and truly almost never), one of these creatures may accidentally and absent-mindedly stuff an unwary backpacker into one of its capacious cheek pouches and carry the person home to its tidy and clean underground nest, but will release the backpacker immediately after recognizing its mistake, especially if offered a snack such as a handful peanuts or a slice of dried apple. (This is a good reason to carry snacks.)

Hamsters are well known as both solitary and territorial and may fight to the death when encountering one of their own kind, but harbor no innate animosity toward humans at all, and have some of the softest and cleanest fur of all mammals.

So if you happen to be accidentally abducted by one of these beasts and find yourself in its sweet-smelling, grass-lined nest, then relax. Chill for a while. Your schedules will mesh perfectly. You'll be out and about during the day and your host will conveniently be gone all night, so that works.

You will be safe there, and may even decide to stay a few days, but be sure to do all your cooking outside, well away from the nest, and please try to remain polite and respectful of your host, who will treat you as a friend unless you go out of your way to be annoying, in which case it may nip your head off and suck out your blood. Before eating the rest of you. Just something to keep in mind.

We few, we grumpy few, we rumply-hat geezers say to you Effort or Eff it. No sniveling.

Definitions: Bayou

(1) Your point of view, as imagined by someone else: "Is that OK bayou, then?" Never meant sincerely.

(2) A small but hurtful piece of water. More correctly but less colorfully pronounced as "bay ow". The hurt may be caused by a large number of biting amphibious mud-suckers, over-aggressive mosquitoes, or simply by falling out of a boat onto sharp, pointy sticks, which happen to be quite common in these waters.

(3) Water that is wet but not really happy about it.

This form of water never raises its voice in song, doesn't burble or prance gaily, splashingly, or otherwise, down a sunshine-dappled mountainside covered with mossy boulders and speckled with brilliantly-colored flowers.

This water does not roar mightily or make giant sucking sounds, though some of the things that live in it might. In fact most of them do. Often. During the hours of darkness.

Pretty generally speaking, this is water that is severely, clinically depressed.

Dark, sluggish, barely moving, bayous are as one expert has said "usually located in low-lying areas" unlike your hilltop-dwelling lakes or your cliff-hugging rivers or your artesian wells that just squirt up right out of nowhere and go zooming around all over, making happy cackling sounds.

No, folks, the Choctaw Indians had it right. For them the word was "bayuk", meaning either "a small, sluggish stream" or alternately, as we more highly educated individuals might put it now, a bay of yuk, a pit of muck, a miasma of regret.

Your average bayou is clogged with creepy soft wet plants that you're afraid might follow you home, and is a natural habitat for lots of semi-conscious angry things with strange evil desires and too many legs. Things you might have dreamed of once, but were relieved to find, in the light of day, didn't really exist.

Well, they do exist after all, and lurk in bayous, and they're waiting for you to come for a visit some day, and then they'll show you what "depressed" is all about. Yessir, they just may.

Your education will commence when you hear that sucking sound right behind you, coming your way.

Source: How to talk in the woods.

Definitions: Boulder Hopping

(1) Hiking from rock to rock without touching the ground in between.

Dangerous. Tricky. And small rocks don't count.

They should be too big to step over. Boulders. Got it?

(2) Somewhere in the deepest wilds of ancient, uncharted Scandinavia there was once a large stone. A very large stone.

There are many there still, the stones, and there are stones in other places as well. Stones are common, but this stone was not. This stone was completely different. This stone had a voice.

It used its voice to sing.

It sang not well as the short, evanescent lives of humans tend to judge these things, but you know what they say about talking dogs. Anyway, the stone sang.

People came from every farthest corner of the known world to wonder at this stone, as it sat centered in a small, vigorous stream. A stream that any man could throw his sword over (and some children as well), but yet too fiercely, aggressively vigorous to cross.

So there sat the stone. Solid. Unmoving. Endlessly singing to itself in one warbling roaring bass note.

The "Bullra Sten", the "Noisy Stone" it was named. So it was called. So they called it. And it sat for ages, just there, unmoving, in that one solitary place.

For ages. And ages untold.

And whenever a few gathered and drew near, or even one alone it seems, the stone sang directly to them, or to that one person, in its profound deep voice. It sang of the day and it sang of the night. Of the seasons, and of the snow, and of the rain. Of the light and of the darkness. Of eternity.

The stone sang of loneliness and of lost love and war and of the peace that follows death.

The stone sang to no one, but yet it sang to all — to itself, by itself, and all who came and heard the stone were certain that it sang for them alone, to them only.

And when these people returned to their homes, many returned not always buoyant, not always cheerful, not always smiling, not always feeling awash in sunshine and light, but reassured somehow. Always reassured that no matter their fate, no matter what the stone had told them, still it was ultimately for the best, and that all would be set right during the final tally at life's end.

Tales of the stone, the Bullra Sten, the Boulder Rock, the Singing Earthstone, the Fate-stone, the Divider of life and of death, these tales spread far and wide.

Many wished to visit the great stone but few could manage the difficult journey to such a remote location, or even could manage to learn where it lay. In any case the stone seemed to take notice of none. It did not care who came and who went, many or few, or when. The stone sat, through the ages, and only sang its song.

And then one day, one day seemingly like all the others, the stone was there no more. No one had seen it go. It had not rolled. It certainly had not walked. It was too massively great to have been carried off, and no one would have dared try.

But it was gone, and its voice as well was gone. The stone's massive throbbing voice filled the valley no longer, leaving a great empty void.

The voice of the stone was now silence itself, if there can be a sound emanating from a thing not there, and perhaps there can, for the silence itself became a great looming presence.

But people still came.

People came to the very same spot that they had always come to, and they stood, reverently, and gazed at the place in the stream's bed where the stone had sat. Where it had sat since before the forefathers of their forefathers or the mothers of their greatest great-grandmothers had walked the earth.

The people came, and stood in reverence, and it seems, at whiles, that some, the quietest and most reverent, could still make out the distant echoes of the stone's now silent song. So they honored the stone, even in its absence. They celebrated.

At midsummer, in the farthest reach of the coldest wasteland where once had stood the singing stone, a few gathered and celebrated even in the midst of their sadness for the missing stone.

And on the very peak of the arching forehead of a nearby stone, a stone almost - very nearly - a sibling of the original but yet some distance from the stream, they hung garlands of hops, and bathed that stone with flagons of ale, in worshipful memory of their lost singing stone. This then, this ceremony came to be called Boulder Hopping.

In recent years, boulder hopping has become a major party-time blowout and Trans-Euro televised sporting event.

Hot babes in bikinis, motocross races, championship soccer, and scores of food stands fill the valley for two crazy, fun-filled midsummer weeks every June. Get two of anything on a stick for the price of one, and any tattoo imaginable While-U-Wait. No problemo, come one come all. Bring cash.

Come early, stay late. Day and night, 24 hours without end. All partying all the time.

Toke up on local herbs and chill out in the neon green fiberglass pagoda (fully climate controlled) built exactly on the spot where the original Big Mutha Rock used to sit, and wait for word from the Other Side, thru your own ear buds. (And there's an app for that too. Great!)

Buy your admission by the day or get a two-week Full-On Full-Throat Event Pass and save big. BIG!

You won't live forever so Don't Miss It Again This Year!

Even bigger, even better than ever before!

More babes!

More food on more sticks!

More of everything!

Don't miss the greatest next, greatest ever EuroVent! You Will Not Regret It!

10 Essential Myths — First Aid

Number five: Getting a bit wound up.

Of all the things you could take backpacking with you that are not needed to do the backpacking, first-aid supplies come at the top of the list.

First-aid supplies don't help you get up in the morning. They don't feed you. They aren't fun to play with. (Although if you're stuck in your tent waiting out a week of rain, you might see what you can do.)

First-aid supplies won't make you smarter, won't let you hiker farther, won't help you take better photos, but they might save your life.

They might.

If you're the sort of dildo who sets himself on fire every day or so. If you're the sort of doofus who falls off mountains pretty regularly. If you're the sort of whiz-bang, coonskin-hat-wearing ding-dong howling random incompetent who shouldn't even be allowed to know that there is such an implement as a knife.

If even one of those descriptions fits you, then maybe you're lucky to still be here. If so, then the rest of us aren't. Sad but true.

This is where first-aid supplies can come in handy. For us as well as you, because someone coming back from getting water at the spring, seeing his tent flapping in the breeze and mistaking it for an attacking gryphon (or, really, any mythological creature) and then bombarding it with fist-sized stones isn't all that safe to be around.

At the very least we might want to tape down your arms and legs, put extra tape over your mouth, and decide tomorrow morning whether to peel it off or just leave you here.

So I guess first-aid supplies have some use after all.

Possibly. Though mostly they are things you carry around unused for years and years and, if you do turn up with a small cut or scrape, you find that all the bandage adhesive has dried out and any disinfectants or ointments have evaporated in their bottles leaving behind only a gummy residue, so you do without nevertheless. Such is life as we live it.

We more normal people.

You there, back at yesterday's camp, still bound up in tape, rolling on the ground struggling to free yourself, no. We don't think about you all that much now that we've gotten rid of you. We feel safe. Cozy. Relaxed, come to think of it, and we no longer worry about what you'll do next.

So maybe first-aid supplies are OK then.

And if you do get free and come galumphing after us, bounding gaily down the trail, well, we shall at the first opportunity turn once again to our handy first-aid kit in search of more weaponry.

Insect repellent is now considered part of first-aid. A good stiff spritz of it might at least slow you down. Probably worth a shot.

There's that tape, as long as it lasts, and if we hog-tied you once we can do it again.

Rubber gloves, if we have them, can power a slingshot, all the better (combined with a handful of pebbles) to zing you with.

Aside from the odd poking, prodding, or nipping implement, most of the other stuff in a first-aid kit wouldn't be that helpful, but all we really need is to distract you for a while, and slow you down so's we can scram outta your vicinity and make a clean getaway, so maybe, as long as someone made the mistake of inviting you to come on our trip, having a few first-aid supplies close to hand might not be a totally bad thing after all. A necessary evil.

Unlike you. The other kind of evil.

10 Essential Myths — Ilumination

Number four: Peek a boo. I see you!

Have you ever been out camping? At all?

Probably, right? Or else you wouldn't be reading this, nut cruncher that you are.

You can take it.

You've been there. All alone in the dark. Sleeping peacefully after a day of backpacking.

And then you have to take a whiz.

Which is something you can't do inside your tent, no matter how little you actually want to get out of your sleeping bag, put on your shoes, and go stumbling around in the dark.

Which is why you need illumination.

Illumination (a flashlight, headlamp, or whatever) will help you get out there, do your business, and get you back to bed, where you belong. Without too much chance of you wandering off and getting entirely lost, or of going over a cliff. Both of these are real bummers, as those who can speak from experience will tell you.

Illumination will help you get out there, do your business, and get back to your bed, but it will not prevent you from having to get up in the first place, which would be even better. Much, much better. Makes you wonder why we're getting fancier lights all the time, but no one has figured out a way to stay in bed and blow off all that wandering around in the dark.

And there's another thing. The eyes.

Take a decent light with you when you leave the safety of your tent, shine it around here and there to get your bearings, and you can just about bet on finding a lot of eyes out there, looking back.

All those eyes — so very many of them — all turned your way.

They're waiting for you.

Waiting for you to step away from the security of your zipped-up tent and take a few steps into the woods. Just a few steps, that's all. That's enough. Just a few steps.

You are, after all, a stranger here, and don't know your way around, which is why you have that headlamp on your noggin, that flashlight in your hand. Either of which will show you a few things though not much — mostly the eyes.

But more importantly, having that light on your person, shining it around, left, right, up, down. Well, that's a bright beacon signaling. Signaling that the big-city doofus is up, in the dark, defenseless, and also signaling exactly where your doofus self is located.

Ever think of that?

You will now.

10 Essential Myths — Insulation

Number three, a big one.

So you've decided to go backpacking, and you've decided to wear clothes while you do that.

Congrats. Now what?

Easy.

Take extra.

Mom told you this, but maybe you weren't listening. Well, get smart then and listen up once.

The Classic 10 Essentials have "Extra Clothing" right there on the list. What part of extra clothing is giving you cognitive constipation? Eh?

You know the meanings of

• Clothing, and
• Extra clothing.

Done.

So take it. Or not. It's up to you if you want to lie there uncomfortable all night, or even croak out a horrible plaintive call for help while you shiver yourself to death. Really. And don't phone me. I'm at home where it's warm and predictable and where I have plenty of cat toys to amuse myself with. (It's a hobby_, OK?)

But if you do decide to go backpacking, and to take some extras along, and go with the New Age bumfuzzle of saying "Insulation" when you mean "Extra Clothing", then you'll have to think about it.

Like what your goal is.

Want to stay warm? Then maybe taking extra is good. Though staying home is always safer.

Want to come home alive? Then maybe taking extra is good. Unless you take too much and that thing back there is able to catch you because you can't run so fast all loaded down like that.

Want to stay comfy? Then maybe taking extra is good. If you have someone else to carry it for you. Otherwise, it's a whole lot like work, don't you think?

Want to be annoying and whiny? Then maybe winging it is good, with no preparation whatsoever, and you get to die from it too. (They call that a toofer.)

As the high lords of backpacking say, "Conditions can abruptly turn wet, windy or chilly in the backcountry, so it's smart to carry an additional layer of clothing in case something unexpected prolongs your exposure to the elements." Can't beat that as an example of conventional advice, but there's more...

"Ask this question: 'What is needed to survive the worst conditions that could be realistically encountered on this trip?'"

Well, this is where "accepted wisdom" goes off the rails, crashes, and explodes.

It's hard to imagine anything much worse than being out there, farting contentedly after supper, and then looking up and realizing that you have about six seconds to tune your thoughts to the fact that the Earth is about to be hit by a giant flaming space rock. Headed for your tent.

In this case, you can tear up that little card listing the 10 Essentials because, really, they aren't. You should know this by now because we've been over some of the other items already. But maybe you're slow. Who can say? You never know what hikers are thinking, or even if they are thinking, so (fair warning here, folks) I'm not worrying about what you'd do. Expect the worst and prepare for it, or accept that no matter what happens, you're screwed.

Just to rub in how blindingly pointless this all is, have a couple definitions dealing with today's subject.

Hat: An undead thing worn on the head, in the sense that it can't be a live animal (or plant), and a dead one would be spooky, so it's something else, not living, not dead. Undead.

The simplest kind of hat is a bag worn over the head, such as a knit hat, which in some circles is called a tuque (or stocking cap), and is also fine when used for robbing banks.

This style of hat is good if you like to sleep late or bump into things, because it covers the eyes. It is possible to roll up the hat's bottom edge to uncover the eyes, but then the eyes get cold, so what's the point? Better to stay indoors in cold weather, as noted above.

Other hats have more complicated parts, but they're too hard to figure out, so let's stop here.

Wind Chill: (Also known as the Wind Chill Factor) A favorite dramatic device of poofy-haired TV weatherpersons, largely used to scare the stupid.

Here's what wind chill really is: How it feels to stand in a cold breeze.

Standing in a cold breeze makes you feel colder than you would if you had enough clothes on, or weren't stupid enough to stand in a cold breeze. Other than that wind chill is simply an amusing idea.

The reverse of wind chill, which we can use for an interesting example from the other end of the thermodynamic spectrum, is something that doesn't have a name, but we can call it, oh, say, scalding. That sounds good as far as it goes, but in fact it would be much more impressive (befuddlingly frighteningly impressive even) if we called it not just scalding but dynamically interactive superhot scald flow.

Just between you and me, what we're talking about for this exercise is pouring boiling hot water onto your hand.

Now, in case you are one of those brainless dumb-bunnies, please don't actually go and do this. Not right now. Give it about a week, so no one can trace where you got the idea, then have at it if you really need to. If you were to actually do this (which you shouldn't want to unless you are very, very stupid), well then you would get a big owie on your hand. The big owie you got from pouring hot water on yourself would be even bigger than the owie you got by simply sticking the same hand into a pot of hot water at the same temperature as the other hot water. (Don't do this either, OK?)

It's a bigger owie when the water flows because flowing water can run more heat past your hand.

You can probably understand that.

If not, then try harder.

Hint: because your hand soaks up more heat from more water.

Now getting back to wind chill, let's see if you can follow this. So what happens is that you get the opposite effect by standing in a cold wind with your nubbins hanging out. Standing around on a cold day with exposed nubbins will make you feel cold, but if the wind is blowing, then the air in that wind can make off with more of your body heat the way a crazed monkey can make off with your wallet a lot better if it's running away than just standing there, masturbating, and chewing on the wallet.

If you find a monkey standing there and chewing on your wallet, probably the best thing to do would be to grab the wallet, remove the valuable things, give back the wallet, and be on your way as quickly as possible, avoiding emotional involvement if you can, and before the monkey's relatives show up and begin sending out wedding invitations and putting up decorations. (Which might happen if you have the masturbating kind of monkey.)

You can do this if the monkey is preoccupied with its own nubbin thingy (or whatever they are called in polite society) and standing there, than if it is running away like crazy, which, unfortunately, crazy monkeys tend to do. But you might get lucky.

Not in that sense but in the sense of encountering a stationary masturbating monkey that won't nip off a finger and give you rabies besides while you engage in a brief tug-of-war to get your wallet back. All of this is in fact germane, though you might not think so at first (it becomes clearer on re-reading).

Confusion is what the poofy-haired weatherpersons are all about anyway, and it's completely possible that none of them really know what they're talking about. At all. In fact, it's likely. And if they do really know anything, they're trying to make it confusing. But it's not.

The thing about wind chill is that the temperature is exactly the same with wind chill and without wind chill. The only difference is that when the wind is blowing, even a little, you feel colder. Most people don't know this, but then again that isn't too surprising because you know what most people are like.

The odds are that you in fact are one of them. Have a nice day, if possible, and keep one eye on the sky.

10 Essential Myths — Sun Protection

Myth #2: Sun Protection

First, I guess you could say that if the sun is dangerous, then why is Earth so close to it? Ever think about that?

Right at this moment there's a volcano in Chile that's exploding all over the place. "Calbuco", it's called, and it's got lots of people running around waving their arms in the air. Imagine what happens if the sun explodes. Worse, right? So then, why are we here?

The answer is that the sun isn't dangerous. Not that dangerous. It's useful.

The sun is good for plants and all living things. Just ask the nearest lizard. Lizards go out of their way to intercept as many solar rays as they possibly can. Doubters say that's why lizards are covered in scales but scales are just a kind of skin and you'll quickly see exactly how much protection they offer the next time you bite a lizard.

Protection? Practically none, though it pays to take your time working up from small lizards to like the alligators and so on. Some of them are cranky.

So where were we? Somewhere around debating the existence of the sun.

Since we also have eyes, I guess you could argue either side:

• Eyes are for finding the sun so you can keep away from it, or
• Eyes are for finding the sun so you can use it properly.

You might as well say the same thing about beer. I know which side of that debate I'm on. But for the moment, let's pretend that I don't count. Let's pretend that you do, and you're afraid of the sun and its UV rays, infrared rays, visible rays, magnetic storms, neutrino flux, and other stuff. What?

What then? How to cope?

Wear Clothes

First, try wearing clothes. I've found over the years, by trial and error as much as anything else, that wearing clothes makes me less visible to others — maybe to the sun too. If the sun can't pick you out of a crowd, then it can't zap you without incinerating everyone else at the same time. Since nature tends to conserve what it's got to work with, you'll probably escape the worst of it by looking like those other doofuses out there. So wear clothes.

Wear Sunglasses

Then, wear sunglasses. People seem to like other people wearing sunglasses quite a bit, especially if the sunglass-wearers are at least partly clothed, depending on who you are. Hey — don't ask me. It just works.

But they're expensive, sunglasses.

If you can't afford any real sunglasses, cut some out of cardboard. Use one of your crayons and color it all black, then punch a little hole in the center of each "lens". Walk around looking out of your holes and smile stupidly. Again — why? I don't know either, but look up Kim Kardashian. She knows how to work it, and has even made a career out of it. Plus her butt.

Are you even that smart?

Think it over.

Use Sunscreen

This can be a real pisser.

The only sunscreen that really works under all conditions is a sheet of half-inch plywood held up over your head. Or thicker, but the half-inch stuff weighs around 25 pounds (11 kg), so. Then you need handles under it to protect your fingers, and there can be problems in high winds. A gust caught my cousin Ed one day and we're still looking for him, so if you're not all that beefy, better think about it.

Your other option is to smear goop on your skin.

Again — who's the expert? Lizards. Ever see a goopy lizard?

Ah, no. Lizards are dry and dusty, generally in that order, so methinks goop is another marketing ploy. Someone out there, maybe someone wearing clothes, and odd clothes at that, someone working in a tall building covered in an unhealthy quantity of glass, wants you to go goopy for reasons unconnected to your own needs.

And they want you to pay for it. Sound suspicious?

It does to me.

What I say is (and you may quote me) — only one word — cheap.

Goop costs a bunch. Cheap stuff doesn't.

What's cheap?

Think about it. Think.

What needs sun protection for the long term? Like decades. What?

Houses.

Houses do.

And what do they put on houses?

Paint.

Try paint.

Granted, this isn't like the old days. Oil-based paint, that stuff whose aroma you could spend a whole day inhaling, is hard to get any more, but the water-based stuff is just as good, if less fun out on the back porch.

Anyhow, give yourself a good coat (brilliant white is probably best), wait a few hours, and do it again. Let dry overnight, and then get out there and make all the tracks you want.

The really cool part is, once you've got a good hard shell of paint on, you don't need clothes anymore, and you'll never get sunburned again either. For years.

And if you don't like white, there's lots of other colors. By the gallon. Check it out.

What The Pros Do

Sometimes.

Like "Carhop". He's a thru-hiker. Working his way along all of the National Scenic Trails. Solo.

So, what?

Well, he hikes at night.

Everyone knows that when the time comes and someone wants to take a rocket to the sun and not burn up, they'll have to go at night. Carhop has applied that principle to thru-hiking, which shows that some hikers are smart too.

Granted, he's got two vehicles, driving ahead a day's hike, resting, then hiking back to the first vehicle overnight, then leapfrogging past the second vehicle, and so on. And that might be a bit expensive, but compared to goopy sunscreen, it's probably cheaper in the long run.

And since it's all at night, no one can tell if you're wearing clothes. And since it's all dark, you can do other stuff, though maybe we'll have to get to that in another post.

Conclusion

Busted or not? Myth or solid gold?

A lot depends on your point of view, I guess.

If you're more like a lizard, enjoy eating bugs, are potentially poisonous, and relish scuttling from one hot rock to another, then you're in the clear.

On the other hand, if you're pasty white, or painted white (or some other designer color from the Sherwin-Williams catalog) and get a thrill from loping through the night woods, howling every now and then, well that works too.

Works for lots of us.

10 Essential Myths — Navigation

Myth #1: Navigation

You may have heard of the 10 Essentials, but how often have you used them? No, seriously — in the shower, at work, while you take a nap with the cat? Ever?

Get the drift here? essential is the key word, and if you don't need something to survive, then how essential is it, really?

Personally, I've whittled my list down to three items: beer, cigarettes, and cookies. But I don't smoke any more, so that leaves more room in my pack for beer (on hot days) or cookies (like in the winter when I need more vitamin C). In case you were wondering why I'd need more vitamin C in the winter, I mean C as in chocolate. Screw that other stuff that you get from orange juice. I consider it just another industrial chemical.

So WTF as all the kool kidz say — where are we going with this?

Hiking, Dick. Hiking. And when you go hiking you can leave out lots of stuff. It's the quickest way to ultralightness ever.

Number One on our list of things to scrutinize is Navigation. And the rule is...don't sweat it. It's cool. No matter where you go, there you are, so it's only a head game you play with yourself if you start getting into that whole goal-oriented uptight location crap.

If you don't have some krypto-fascist plan on getting somewhere, then you can mellow out, and hiking actually gets close to being fun.

Let's be mellow then.

The Classic 10 Essentials List has a Map as number one. The New Age essentials list (which contains 10 or 13 items, or maybe some random number out to 11 decimal places) takes what is known as a systems approach and says that Navigation is what you want. Instead of just a Map.

'K then. Want to navigate away?

If so, you'll need a topographic map, and some other "assorted" maps, and a waterproof container to put them in, and a magnetic compass, and an (optional) altimeter and/or GPS receiver.

All so very fine, until you say again — WTF?

When I started backpacking I could get a dandy paper map for about $2.50, which was a lot of money. I thought. Then. I think it's six bucks these days.

And now, if six bucks wasn't bad enough, we're looking at a Garmin Monterra GPS for $650 green ones. Granted, it has "a brilliant 4 in. screen, 8-megapixel camera and wireless Android compatibility", and supposedly "delivers state-of-the-art navigation alongside all your favorite Android apps from Google Play", but what's wrong with a paper map and some after-supper masturbation instead of whatever pale imitation of fun that Google Play offers?

I mean, hey. The analog life was fine, so what changed then?

I'm still analog. I still have analog needs. I can amuse myself for hours by watching clouds, and if it's a clear evening with no clouds, then swatting flies and mosquitoes is more than enough to occupy me. I don't need no stinkin' Androids lurking in the background.

But maybe you think you do. Maybe.

But maybe you're a dope.

What used to be a map and a rough-hewn ability to figure out which way was approximately north is now a system. You got

• Map.
• Compass.
• Wrist altimeter.
• GPS thing.
• Calculations.
• Need for wads of cash.
• Fear of doing some thinking.

How much of this is essential? Really? Really essential?

Probably color vision couldn't hurt. I got a problem there. Those Forest Service maps with the thin red line showing the trail send me into map-shredding frenzies because I can't see the damn line. And I lived despite all that, so screw altimeters and GPS, whatever the hell that's supposed to be, and Androids, and even maps.

You got any brains at all, you know about where you are and which way is home. Got doubt nibbling at your nuts, go suck a thumb. Then stick it up in the air and that'll tell you which way the wind is blowing, if you need to know that.

Then walk.

You'll either get where you're going or not. Either is fine.

No one but you really cares anyway.